One of the least discussed problems is with Ben.
And it deals with the traditional paradox of time travel.
A paradox a statement or proposition that, despite sound (or apparently sound) reasoning from acceptable premises, leads to a conclusion that seems senseless, logically unacceptable, or self-contradictory. As Issac Asimov explained the classic literary example is “What if you go back into the past and kill your grandfather when he was still a little boy?” This event would change the person's world so dramatically, that the killer would not be born. So complex and hopeless are the paradoxes…that the easiest way out of the irrational chaos that results is to suppose that true time-travel is, and forever will be, impossible, Asimov said.
The grandfather paradox is from time travel literature which states that a person who goes back in time can massively alter future events.
When a few of the 815 survivors time travel to Dharmaville in 1974, a young boy is already present on the island. His name was Ben Linus. He was an unhappy boy. His father was a drunk janitor who blamed his wife death on Ben. (She died during child birth). As a result, Ben and his father were never close. Ben was brought to the island by his father because he needed work. Ben became an introvert and apparently only had one friend in the island school. At some time, Ben began to see visions of his dead mother in the jungle. Ben became rebellious over the the Dharma rules, and he sought out to join the Others. He met Richard Alpert in the jungle, but Ben was told it was not time yet.
But whatever time line was supposed to happen, changed when the 815ers time traveled to 1974. During the encounter with Sayid in 1977, Ben was mortally wounded in the chest. Juliet could not do anything to save Ben. Jack refused to help, knowing what adult Ben would do to them after Flight 815 crashed on the island. So Juliet and Kate take it upon themselves to deliver bleeding Ben to Alpert. Alpert takes Ben, but tells them he would be "forever changed." Ben is taken to the temple to be saved.
And here is begins the problem. Juliet, a medical doctor, could not save Ben from dying of his wounds. If Ben was taken to the temple, we have to assume that the same ceremony would have been performed by Dogen as he did on mortally wounded Sayid after the time skips stopped. When Sayid was treated in the temple pool, he died. But much later, he was reincarnated as a soul less Sayid who recognized his own internal darkness.
One has to assume that Ben also "died" in the temple, because medical science could not save him. And if he died and then was "reincarnated," he also became evil. Now, some people will say that assumption is false. Ben was "saved" by the Others so he grew up as he normally did prior to the time skips. However, if as a boy being shot in 1977, Ben would have had to change his personality and outlook on life.
But another problem with the major time event is that Ben did not remember Sayid when Flight 815 crashed on the island. Would you not remember who shot you at point blank range? Now, some may argue that Ben would have not known of Sayid because the shooting did not take place until later in the series. But we are not talking about seasonal episode air dates as being relevant. The story stated Ben was shot in 1977. Then 30 years later, his killer returns to his island.
Ben knows just about everything about the island, so his boyhood memories would not have been erased. He began the Other's spy within the Dharma group. He rose up to take command of the Others by purging the Dharma people with poison gas. He should have known about Sayid.
Further, if Ben died in 1977, there would have been no Ben led Dharma group bent on kidnapping and terrorizing the 815 survivors.
Another problem is what did Ben become after the temple ritual. Clearly, if he followed Sayid's path, Ben was a soul less being - - - which could have been manipulated by Jacob or MIB. But then again, why did Ben get a second chance at life when the other people on the island did not? Or did the temple waters actually create a new smoke monster in the form of Ben?
It set into motion the same type of mass destruction we have seen other smoke monsters, like Crazy Mother, do to inhabitants on the island.
The writers cannot give us a grandfather paradox moment and not explain why there was no consequences in the future.
